<< Three years ago, Obama was singing a different tune when it came to bankruptcy. “I know that when people even hear the word ‘bankruptcy,’ it can be a bit unsettling, so let me explain what I mean,” Obama told worried auto workers in 2009, when he announced that hemight take GM and Chrysler bankrupt — as indeed happened weeks later. Bankruptcy, the president said, is simply a “tool that we can use” to “make it easier for General Motors and Chrysler to quickly clear away old debts that are weighing them down so they can get back on their feet and onto a path to success.” It is not, Obama insisted, “a process where a company is simply broken up, sold off, and no longer exists.” >>